Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/10/2026Congratulations to Joshua Kutryk and the rest of Crew 13 on reaching space today! First Albertan in #space! 🔭🔬 #Alberta 1161
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Not sure why, but this somehow became the sounds of the summer 010
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 12/09/2026This is the most cyberpunk shit I've ever read. www.nytimes.com/2026/09/11/o... 🧪nytimes.com 121
Reposted by Kevin OlsenESA Space Science @science.esa.int · 07/09/2026Mercury, here we come! 🛰️ 🌑 Eight years and nine planetary flybys later, the ESA/JAXA BepiColombo mission has parted ways with its Mercury Transfer Module – the first critical step in its Mercury Arrival Phase. Catch up on how it happened ICYMI 👉 www.esa.int/Enabling_Sup... 🔭 🧪 #planetsci 1/2esa.intBepiColombo begins Mercury arrival with MTM separation successOn 3 September 2026 at 15:49 CEST, the European Space Agency's BepiColombo Mission Control Team at the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) received the signal they had been waiting for&n... 19224
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 09/09/2026We need clear policies in place about using AI to write and review, but this relies on honesty among authors, editors, and reviewers. Would we even know if our manuscripts were fed to an AI to judge? 🧪🔭 @science.org www.science.org/content/arti...science.orgCan AI help solve the peer-review crisis? Here are its promises and pitfallsAmid a shortage of human reviewers, tests indicate AI can assist—but is not a savior 020
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 09/09/2026www.birdoftheyear.org.nz Bird if the Year! Let's go crested grebes and herons!!! 🪶🦉 020
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 07/09/2026ESA brought out the big ExoMars Rosalind Franklin rover to #EPSC2026 in Den Haag. 🍁 Canada was an original supporter of the ExoMars programme and provided the wheels and suspension and lenses for the cameras! It's been a long time coming to get this far!!! #planetsci 🧪🔭 2234
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 07/09/2026Impacting elections was always the value of Twitter AfD’s lead candidate thanked Musk “for your support...Iwould very much welcome the opportunity for strong and constructive cooperation”. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/s...theguardian.comGermany’s far-right AfD thanks Elon Musk as France warns state election win a ‘serious moment’Lead candidate in Saxony-Anhalt welcomes further ‘strong’ cooperation with Musk as French minister says ‘we cannot forget our history’ 000
Reposted by Kevin OlsenPhil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 30/08/2026And this was the exact moment I stopped using Google maps 65724117
Reposted by Kevin OlsenMark Hamill @markhamillofficial.bsky.social · 30/08/2026SHOUT-OUT to Political Cartoonist extraordinaire & Member of the Order of Canada Michael de Adder, who routinely does a far better job of holding this administration accountable than the corporate media. Thank you for your attention to his brilliant satirical wit! 🙏 (also: 🤣) 557241326661
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 31/08/2026Félicitations to the entire team behind the Nancy Grace Roman space telescope that had a successful launch on a falcon heavy (two boosters returned). This is a flagship level space telescope following JWST and Hubble. It's namesake was the first female NASA exec, key planner of Hubble! #planetsci 🔭🧪 0336
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 28/08/2026The name Lake Ontario comes from the Wendat word Ontari’io 🧪🍁 23620
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 24/08/2026This #Oxfordpubreview comes from Dieu du Ciel in Montreal. Gorgeous burger, appealing textures, especially the bun. Really let the burger stand out rather than being buried under bacon and sauce. Tastiest fries in Montreal so far! (Benelux is a second) 020
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 22/08/2026"We recognized that sometimes its signature was written in pencil." What a line from Carney! www.cbc.ca/news/politic...cbc.caRead Mark Carney's full speech after trade talks with the U.S. collapsed | CBC NewsBelow are Prime Minister Mark Carney's remarks after Canada suspended trade talks with the U.S. and the Trump administration imposed new 50 per cent tariffs: 020
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 21/08/2026Big result from the APXS and Curiosity teams pulling cover of @science.org Pure sulphur revealed inside stones pulverized under the rovers wheels! They propose billions years old magmatic gases trapped in sulfur-rich clathrates in the subsurface cryosphere. doi.org/10.1126/scie... #planetsci 🔭🧪 0217
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 19/08/2026This the actual Kodak film reel that recorded the first Canadian space experiment: ionograms from the Alouette 1 mission! The spacecraft transmitted a radio signal into the ionosphere and the reflection was received by a ground station and recorded onto 35mm photographic film! 🧪🔭 1292
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 19/08/2026I always found it ironic to go the Washington Post, see their slogan "democracy dies in darkness", only to face a paywall keeping us in the dark.... These days, the paywall is up but the slogan is gone.... 011
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 18/08/2026The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera team have found the recent falcon 9 upper stage crash site on the Moon and just released images! lroc.im-ldi.com/images/1499 #planetsci 🔭🧪 33911
Reposted by Kevin OlsenAstronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans @astroroyalscot.bsky.social · 18/08/2026Remember the 4 tonnes of Space-X debris (15x4m diameter) travelling 5400mph that slammed in to the moon 2 wks ago? Well here's the before and after images that we've all been waiting for! What should we name this new crater? Sadly the name Crisis has already been taken by one of the Mare.🔭🛰️🧪 157217
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 14/08/2026🚨New Mars paper out! Alian Wang et al describe experiments that show how little lightning strikes during Martian dust storms can impact the atmospheric chemistry in a way that may rapidly reduce any methane present! 🔭🧪 #planetsci doi.org/10.1016/j.ep... 1216
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 09/08/2026This isn't news, exactly, but it's shameful to have reached the 'I told you so' phase of climate change. Decades of discussion and most of the world has been powerless while watching governments and industry choose to not act. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...theguardian.comThis burning summer is the proof: the voices of climate denial aren’t just delusional, they’re deadly | Sadiq KhanLook at our blazing forests and parched cities. Green policies aren’t a ‘luxury’, and we can’t burn more oil and gas. People need the truth, says London mayor Sadiq Khan 020
Reposted by Kevin OlsenZack Labe @zacklabe.com · 09/08/2026July 2026 set a new record for the month for near-surface air temperatures across the Tropics. Note the long-term warming trend as well (in all months), as indicated by the shading of the older (blue) to more recent years (red). Data from doi.org/10.24381/cds... 213749
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 30/07/2026These are the long tailed tits! Smaller, rounder, cuter!!! Even with a little pink on their bellies! They bob up and down when they fly! #ukbirding #birds 🪶🦉 160
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 27/07/2026It's been a momentous period in the @oxfordphysics.bsky.social Space Instrumentation Lab. The team has been hard at work building the Flight Model of our half of the @esa.int Comet Interceptor instrument. Last week we received the second spectrometer from @vtt.fi!!! #planetsci 🧪🔭 170
Reposted by Kevin OlsenRandall Munroe @xkcd.com · 24/07/2026Calibration Nobel xkcd.com/3275/ 225220688
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 22/07/2026Hot off the press, a new analysis of InSight seismic data for Mars has revealed some tantalising new structures! This is interpreted as hardened lava tunnels - a transcrustal magmatic system! 🌋 The team is from @ox.ac.uk Earth Sci #planetsci 🔭🧪 doi.org/10.1038/s415...doi.orgSeismic evidence for a melt-depleted lower crust and transcrustal magmatism on Mars - Nature AstronomySeismic data from NASA’s InSight mission reveal a melt-depleted lower crust on Mars and indicate that Earth-like, vertically integrated, transcrustal magmatic systems and associated crustal differenti... 1195
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 17/07/2026Another #oxfordpubreview. This one's from The Grapes, but not in Oxford, these grapes are in Livingston. Haggis and steak fajitas 🤣🤣🤣🏴 010
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 15/07/2026As promised, no more Canadian birds, no more winter! Here are the first British birds, English tits! In the same family together, chickadees are found in North America, while the tits are found in Eurasia and Africa. This is the blue tit. Small, fluffy, adorable, and colourful! 🪶🦉 050
Reposted by Kevin OlsenJohn Scalzi @scalzi.com · 13/07/2026As I've noted before, I was given a pair not too long ago (a holiday gift from a large corporation). They haven't come out of the box. 3060746
Reposted by Kevin OlsenPaul Byrne @theplanetaryguy.com · 13/07/2026Friends, we need your help—a 🧵 The White House Office of Management and Budget, led by Project 2025's Russell Vought, wants to destroy how U.S. science has been done since World War II. This @arstechnica.com article is a great primer (apologies for the thumbnail): arstechnica.com/science/2026...arstechnica.comProposed new US funding rules: We can cancel any grant at any timePeer review now optional, political staff would screen grants for forbidden topics. 815598
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 14/07/2026peer review is a secondary consideration, any federal agency may cancel any grant at any time for “national interest," ban grants on culture war topics, limit international collaborations, and block spending on things like publishing papers and attending conferences.🧪 arstechnica.com/science/2026...arstechnica.comProposed new US funding rules: We can cancel any grant at any timePeer review now optional, political staff would screen grants for forbidden topics. 42518
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 13/07/2026Can't believe they didn't mention that Google Glass wearers were called glassholes and the wearable tech was just as unpopular then futurism.com/future-socie...futurism.comThe Backlash Is So Strong That People With "Pervert Glasses" Are Afraid to Use Them in PublicMeta's camera-equipped "AI Glasses" are so divisive that some adopters are reportedly leaving their expensive smart glasses at home. 030
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 07/07/2026Little bio piece about Claire Parfitt, our future-Mars-mission contact at ESA and chair of the International Mars Exploration Working Group (I'm working on one of the subgroups right now!) #planetsci 🔭 www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...bbc.co.ukScientist who cleaned space toilet on work experience now leading Mars exploration teamsClaire Parfitt says her time at the National Space Centre gave her a unique insight. 0215
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 06/07/2026At last, the transition birds!! Chickadees!!! In here are the black-capped and the boreal (brown sides). Looking fluffy, round and cute!! 🦉🪶 130
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 04/07/2026The adorable, unassuming dark eyed junco! From Alberta, in the snow at Christmas! 🪶🦉 110
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026Probably the comeback of the tourney. Two goals in the last five minutes 😅 ⚽ 041
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026A very rare find! This is a Lapland longspur, these migrate through Alberta from the high Arctic to the southern prairies. Around some horses, this one found shelter, a food supply, and access to open water. Thus, it was overwintering at the foot of the Rockies near Hinton AB 🪶🦉 170
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026And a pine grosbeak worked it for us, posting on the snow (Hinton AB, Christmas) 🪶🦉 1132
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026And I need to catch up on the birds! #ukbirding #birds 🦉🪶 Here's the northern flicker passing through Alberta at Christmas. Very lucky catch, thanks for stopping by!! 390
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026Why not? Another #Oxfordpubreview? This is Oranges and Lemons, recently opened where the angel and Greyhound was. Wild beer selection, well decorated inside. When they opened they had Greek food and mezze plates. The value for 5 or 7 sharers is high, but it's just a bunch of reheated fried stuff. 😥 010
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026And yet another #Oxfordpubreview!! Lunch at Chiang Mai! Spicy beef salad for the win. Tangy and hot, lots of fresh cucumber and tomato! Yum!! 010
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026Yet another #Oxfordpubreview French bistro Pierre Victoire. Excellent wine selection, really great food. I've had better steak frites with Bernaisse sauce in town, but the starters and desserts were impressive. The menu is pricey. 010
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 01/07/2026Another #Oxfordpubreview!!! Meat is back on the menu at the Punter! Since the pandemic it has been the local vegetarians dream. I suppose this is to boost sales because Botley road has been barricaded for 4 years!!! Terrific fish sandwich. Their veggie scotch eggs are still best in UK! 140
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 12/06/2026What the World Cup 26 refs look like with the referee cams 030
Kevin Olsen @drksolsen.bsky.social · 11/06/2026British Planetary Science Conference #BPSC2026 Emma and Bethan representing @oxfordphysics.bsky.social contributions to the @ukspaceagency.bsky.social UK Space Frontiers 2035 planning 🧪🔭 #planetsci 072
![Comic. [Person 1 with short hair on stage behind podium reading off paper while addressing audience. People are shown sitting in chairs while Person 2 with ponytail and Person 3 waving are walking toward stage.] PERSON 1: This year’s Nobel Prize in “calibrating your equipment carefully and not embarrassing yourself by publishing spurious results” goes to Dr. Adams and Dr. Smith, who did *not* announce the discovery of microbes on Titan. PERSON 3: Thank you, thank you.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:cz73r7iyiqn26upot4jtjdhk/bafkreihztdrvxjeyzmz6dmz3xb4vi6wiwwtge6fwdoxjcum5aptndv3kfm)
